The owner of a Toronto bar and grill is asking for a public apology from city councilor Giorgio Mammoliti who called her establishment a gangster hangout.

Since buying the Classic Cocktails Bar & Grill three years ago, Maria Garcia says she has done everything possible to turn what used to be a place notorious for drugs and violent crimes into a respectable family eatery.

However, last week after a double shooting behind the bar left Tafari Spear, 30, dead and another man seriously injured, Mammoliti called the bar a haven for gangster where cocaine use is rampant.

Garcia, who said that the shooting speaks of dangers in the community and not of her business, says Mammoliti “has tainted my good name,” and she wants him to apology.

“This is the first time since I opened three years ago, the first time the bar itself had to call the police,” Garcia said.

Last June, Garcia hosted a memorial gathering at her restaurant for one of her regular customers, Terrence “T-Bone” Hughes, who was killed during an alleged gang-related incident

The grandmother of five says since buying the bar she has hired ten security guards and people are frisked before they are let in.

“I am doing everything I can do,” Garcia said, “I tried to have a fine-dining restaurant, but it didn’t work. I need to make money and I do that with the bar and restaurant.”

In addition to the guards, Garcia installed 16 surveillance cameras and refused to let anyone with bandanas to enter the bar.

Meanwhile, Mammoliti said Garcia bar acts as a club, for which it isn’t licensed, and he frequently gets complaints from residents living nearby.

He is appealing to the province to remove the bar’s liquor permit and said the city would not be renewing its license and said “I am not going to apologize who is clearly attracting mobsters and bringing danger into Ward 7.”